Boys, 13, Make It 669 Miles in Mom's Swiped BMW

The boys allegedly drove more than 650 miles before they were caught in an alley in Kansas City. (Mapquest)

(Newser)
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Two 13-year-old Ohio boys who stole a mother's car and drove it 669 miles to Kansas City, Mo., were found sleeping in a downtown alley, police said. The runaways from the Columbus area apparently gave their location away when one posted on Facebook that they were stuck in Kansas City without any gas, adds the Columbus Dispatch; seems mother Catherine Johnson had by that point cut off a credit card son Cole had swiped along with the keys. The boys were taken into custody yesterday by officers investigating a suspicious vehicle that matched the description of Johnson's BMW. "They were fine, fortunately," said a police spokesman. "I think there are definitely a whole lot of things that could have gone wrong for them, and having the police find them probably would be one of the better outcomes."

Johnson said Cole had wanted to go to California to skateboard. "How it went on for two days and no one noticed boggles my mind," Johnson said yesterday by phone from Chicago as she waited for a flight to Kansas City to retrieve the boys. Johnson said authorities told her the boys would not be charged, and the car was towed. She has submitted a complaint over how Columbus police initially handled the case because she believes they took hours too long to alert other authorities. (Read more runaway stories.)

At 15 I ran away from Mpls. MN and hitch hiked to Miami. I went with a 17 year old friend, we each carried a change of clothes rolled up in a sleeping bag. We were picked up 18 times in Dade county by the police and never were held more than about 20 minutes. We spent the night of my friends 18th birthday in jail in East St. Louis and walked away from there the next morning. A month later when I finally went home my parents realized the law enforcement in this country is a joke in most cases. Like the story about "Dr. Lynne Fenton, identified in court documents as Holmes' psychiatrist, had alerted a threat-assessment team at CU's Anschutz Medical Campus to concerns about him."Read more: James Holmes' doctor went to cops, ABC News says - The Denver Post http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_21251572/james-holmes-doctor-went-cops-abc-news-says#ixzz22syCIME9 Read The Denver Post's Terms of Use of its content: http://www.denverpost.com/termsofuse